Five Ways to Add Some Math to Your Read Across America Celebration

Hi, Teaching Friends!

Don't you just love a good cross-curricular activity? They are one of the BEST ways to help your students build and use connections! Did you manage to put some literacy learning into your 100th Day celebration? And now, how will you add some standards-based math work into your Read Across America festivities?

Here are five ideas to get you started ... and most require little or no prep or printing!


1. Build a timeline! You've probably already got a big stack of books all rready to use on Read Across America Day. Give each of your students a book (or work in pairs if you're short on books) and a sticky note. Have them write the title and the copyright on the paper, and then use the stickies to build a timeline together.


2. Make tally marks all day long! If your school is like mine, you'll be having "Stop, Drop, and Read" several times throughout the day. Tally how many minutes you spend each time... and every time you add more tallies, choose a student to lead the class in counting them all again!


3. Make a Seuss-themed class book about math. How about a sums of ten book, based on Ten Apples Up on Top? Your students can draw self-portraits, with hands out on either side of them to hold the apples. Give each child 10 apple stickers to divide as they wish between their hands and write the number model. Pop a cover on, bind it, done!


4.  Will you be giving your students special pencils... or stickers... or erasers? Why not put these items to good learning use before you hand them out?  Small items like these are great for estimation activities. Here's a "Sid the Science Guy" video from my First Grade Math Pinterest board that demonstrates a strategy for estimating. What a great way to introduce this activity! While you're watching, keep an eye out for Gerald, who's sure to remind you of at least one of your own students.
Sorry the video isn't embedded, but it's an easy click through.

5. Last but not least, here's a set of two class graphs for collecting and organizing data about your students' reading preferences... because after 10 years of teaching a literacy intervention class where literacy was an element in almost everything we did, I'm pretty much a cross-curricular diehard!  :)
Click here or on the image to download your graph set!

Happy Teaching!

Marching Toward March - Already!!

Hi,Teaching Friends!

Last week, our local Friends of the Library group held its annual Fun Fair for four to seven year olds. It's my privilege and joy to be in charge of the read alouds each year. I get to grab a pile of my favorites and spend two hours reading, one of the parts of teaching that I miss the most since retiring.
So I pick a great big stack of books. I choose some titles that get the kiddos to chime in, like Chicka Boom and Pete the Cat, and others that make their eyes get big and wide, like Steve Jenkin's Actual Size, and always a few that make the moms and dads say, "I remember that one from when I was growing up!", like Are You My Mother?.  The fair also features balloon animals, face painting, and games with prizes, so it makes me really happy when kids make the choice to spend some time enjoying books, too. I'm also delighted to say that the two blondies up front are my two oldest grandchildren, both of whom are World Class Book Lovers.

Talking about reading (which I do a lot of, heh heh), it's time to start getting ready for the Next Big Event, since I'm guessing that most of you are probably pretty ready to move on from  Groundhog-Olympics-Valentines-Presidents-Dental Health- million snow days month. So, Read Across America, here we come!

I'm working on a math freebie for Seuss Day that I'll be sharing at a blog hop next week - watch for news about the hop coming soon!


This week, I also posted two reading related resources. The first has actually been at Teachers Notebook for a while, but now it's also at my Teachers Pay Teachers store. Your students will develop sentence sense and practice sight words while they work at the pocket chart, building sentences that celebrate the love of reading.

 

Click here to see it at TPT.

Click here to see it at TN.

The second resource brings some math into the book theme. It's a set of four color-or-cover math games, so with each partner game you have the option of printing in color and laminating for reuse, or saving some ink by printing in grayscale, with each player working on his or her own sheet. The games are for addition, subtraction, adding doubles, and adding ten. Common Core! :)

 

Click here to see it at TN.

Soon to come at TPT!

 



By the way, if you're already thinking about Easter, there's a bunny set like this one, too!


While you're over at Teachers Notebook, I'm having a giveaway!  Making Predictions is a set of 50 pictures, questions, and graphic organizers that will guide your students in using their schema and evidence to make logical predictions. Click on the picture to enter the giveaway.

Enjoy the rest of your long weekend!
Happy Teaching!